It all started with a video message from Köstinger at the International Tourism Fair in Berlin (ITB), in which she presents the campaign. She does this next to a mountain bike. The Austrian bike scene, which has been fighting for access to forest roads and single trails for years - mostly without success - was immediately astonished and outraged.
 
The image campaign and its criticized contradictions have now intensified the heated debate about the rights of mountain bikers. Meanwhile, the mountain bike scene is taking it partly with fatalistic humor. There is already a satire page on Facebook - with the official slogan of the campaign as the address. A fake subject for the campaign has now even appeared. It shows the Nesslangeralm in Salzburger Land with the slogan "a legally inaccessible destination for mountain bikers". We are talking about access via a forest road, not a single trail. In the fake campaign, the words "Austria" are supplemented with the claim "the North Korea for mountain bikers".
 
Austria's advertising department replies that the two-million-euro campaign aims to offer guests "orientation and safety" by pointing out the legal options for mountain bikers.
 

Further information:

derstandard.at (13.3.2019)
derstandard.at (19.3.2019)
austria.info/en/aktivitaten/radfahren/rad-urlaub-in-osterreich/mountainbiken
facebook.com/YouLikeItBikeIt